President George W Bush, on the road to next week's Republican convention, defended his economic record in hard-hit Ohio as abortion-rights activists marched through New York City on the leading edge of a wave of anti-Bush protests.
Thousands of Republicans poured into New York for Monday's opening of the four-day convention, and police closed streets and tightened security throughout the heavily fortified city as demonstrators stepped up their pace.
Bush, on a week-long tour of key battleground states before he arrives in New York on Wednesday, told about 20,000 cheering supporters in Ohio that his economic policies were working.
"When it comes to expanding our economy, defeating the recession, we're getting the job done," Bush said on Saturday in Troy, Ohio, during a bus tour of a state hit hard by job losses in the manufacturing sector.
Bush touted the big tax cuts he pushed through during the first term of his administration, although he acknowledged Ohio was "lagging behind the national economy."
He called for the use of tax-free savings accounts to help pay for major health care costs and revamped overtime rules that let workers earn time off rather than pay.
His Democratic challenger, Massachusetts Senator John Kerry, attacked Bush's economic record during a rally in Tacoma, Washington, and said the country could not afford another four years of lost jobs, slow growth and creeping poverty.
"The American worker is sliding further and further behind," he told supporters gathered in a stadium parking lot. "We need a president who stands up for the middle class."
Bush's turn in the campaign spotlight next week will give him a stage to tout his first-term record and lay out ideas for another four years while drawing sharp differences with Kerry.
Polls show Bush and Kerry locked in a tight race heading into the convention, which will be capped by Bush's prime-time acceptance speech on Thursday night.
Aides said Bush's speech will include new domestic policy proposals, including possibly a renewed call for adding private accounts to the Social Security retirement program or broad tax reform.